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IT SECURITY

CORNER

Social Media, Digital Footprints and Personal Information.

It is estimated that 90% of people post information online related to their
professional and personal lives. The number is even higher among 18-34
year olds. Across LinkedIn, Instagram and Facebook nearly 55% of users
have publically visible accounts. When an account is public, anyone can
see information you have posted.

Hackers hack people to hack the companies they work for.

Hackers target organizations, such as K-12 schools due to its openness.
We want to tell people all about us and give them easy ways to contact us.
Depending on the hacker’s motivation, they typically look for social security
and credit card numbers. They may also try to trick someone into falsely
sending them money. A lot of the research hackers perform is done viewing
social media.

Update your social media accounts when you start or maintain a job.

Almost half of us daily post where we work, who we work with and what we
are working on. Out-of-office messages we leave are filled with valuable
information: how long you will be gone, a point of contact and where you
are going. Giving out this information can lead a hacker to impersonate the
person who is away from the office. Limit out-of-office messages to
internal staff.

Guessable passwords and using one password for many accounts.

At least 20% of people are believed to use the names of their favorite
sports team, pets’ names or birthdays for PINs and passwords. People also
inadvertently allow hackers access by choosing password reset answers
that often are readily available online, such as their mother’s maiden
name, elementary school and year they were married. If you use the same
password for many accounts and one of your accounts gets compromised,
the hacker now has the ability to gain entry into multiple accounts (possibly
including your bank account). Never use a personal account password for
your District password as this will be one of the first things a hacker will try to
gain access to our systems.

Please pause to simply think and take a few extra seconds for security sake
when posting to your social media.

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